Former governor of Jigawa State, Mallam Sule Lamido has
lambasted the All Progressives Congress (APC) for failing the country,
just as he charged party members to be courageous in the face of
persecution...
Addressing the
forum of PDP Ex- Speakers Thursday in Abuja, Lamido accused President
Muhammadu Buhari-led administration of demonizing PDP members.
While charging
his party members to be courageous and stand up saying Nigeria has been
around before APC and it will be around after APC.
“APC cannot take
us hostage. We need to stand up. We need people to be courageous. No
matter how hard I try, if I move to APC, my soul will not follow me.
Describing “APC
is an alliance of failures”, Lamido recounted that the APC without the
PDP members who joined their fold could not defeat the PDP.
“We shall not
keep quiet. It is our country. Enough of this culture of nepotism and
fear. Governmemt should be respected not feared. Government should be
there for all of us, whether APC and PDP. 2019 will be a defining moment
for Nigeria.”
He canvassed that
the convention should be free and fair, noting that the person who
emerges would enjoy the support of the party members.
He added that
Governor Ayo Fayose of Ekiti state who declared his presidential
ambition is constitutionally entitled to contest the presidential ticket
of the PDP, even though it has been zoned to the North.
On his part, the former Ogun state governor, Otunba Gbenga Daniels said the anti-corruption war should not be politicized.
Daniels debunked the allegations from the ruling party
that Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) members were corrupt, saying
“corruption is not partisan.”
The former governor stated that majority of APC members
were in the PDP and wondered why the APC should tag PDP as corrupt when
evidence from the security agencies pointed that people from other
parties were also involved in corruption.
Daniels, popularly called OGD, stated this while
addressing a conference of former PDP Speakers on his intention to vie
for the Chairmanship if the PDP.
He stated that PDP lost the last election because the
party veered from their original vision which was power to the people,
became complacent and took the people for granted.
He said, “after the last election, we became over
confident and took the people for granted. Power was removed from the
people. Leaders were disconnected from followers. Candidates were
imposed on the people” Daniel said.
According to him, PDP still has better chances to take
over the Presidency if the party is able to reorganise itself as the
world is waiting for its come back.
“It was when PDP took away power from the people that
the party started losing. Party reorganisation is a sine-qua-non for
election victory.
“The world is waiting for us. Put your arts together;
put your house together. We have been labelled as being corrupt but the
truth is that corruption is Nigeria is not partisan.
“On the empirical evidence in the road, I cannot say that our party is more corrupt than the others” he said.
Daniels explained that while he was the governor of Ogun
State he built a permanent state secretariat on a hectre of land with
offices for all the zonal chairman, a feat yet to be replicated by any
state.
He said that his investment in infrastructure has not
been equaled in the state, even though the present administration is
building fly-overs that leads to no where.
He equally claimed that he hosted the best National
Sports festival in 2006 and made a profit of N90 million which has not
been equaled by any state till date.
He argued that party members must come out of their
psychological defeat and realign to form a formidable party that will
sack APC in 2019.
“We must be out of our psychological suppression that we
lost the 2015 election. PDP need to have an able and capable leader.
Building PDP is building democracy and when you build democracy in
Nigeria, you build democracy in Africa” Daniel emphasised.
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